Bree//France: Ma famille française

I will never forget these nights. Nights when I wake up from a nap (which I am apparently known as the girl out of the house who takes the most, go figure) and go downstairs to eat dinner with my French family. Nights when I expect the normal; the discussion of everyday things, the recount of everyone’s day and so on, but I gain the extraordinary.

A table set with candles and a vase of tulips in the center, people who I love gathered around the table, from 5 different countries and 2 different continents. Wine already served around the table and an atmosphere of warmth immediately upon entering the room.

The conversation goes around and around, like the food. They are both wonderful and rich and are just the thing you wanted that you didn’t realize you needed. Stories and laughter are shared; memories of other lives, and of the one we are all experiencing together.

And then we talk about the house, “la maison magique”. This French château, full of charm and love that overflows from every chambre and wall. A house that has brought together people of every origin. People who have no cultural ties, and little similarity beside that of a language that is for some still difficult to get off their tongue. But none the less, life lasting relationships have been made. A sort of family has formed. Sisters. And a second set of parents. And a crazy uncle… my sisters you know of whom I speak (notre homme swiss).

And oh it is so wonderful! It brings such happiness to me that I cannot help but smile and want to cry tears of joy.

We ate good Romainian food. And toasted good French wine. And then added a little Romainian liquor… And sang the beautiful national anthems of around the world.

It is times like these when you realize how sweet the world is. How sweet the cultures and the differences between yourself and others are. And how you should appreciate and love those differences.

There is nothing like this experience of living in a completely different culture, of experiencing different meals, and other daily routines, but above all, it is the love of finding a family in those around the world that merits the most. Finding such love that has no blood connection and no connection through culture; only one of fate.